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Dönmeh
The Dönmeh (Hebrew: דוֹנְמֶה, romanized: Dōnme, Ottoman Turkish: دونمه, Turkish: Dönme) are a group of Sabbatean crypto-Jews in the Ottoman Empire who were forced to convert to Islam, but retained their Jewish faith and Kabbalistic beliefs in secret.
The Sabbatean movement was centered mainly in Thessalonika. It originated during and soon after the era of Shabbetai Tzevi, a 17th-century Romaniote Jewish rabbi and Kabbalist who claimed to be the Jewish Messiah and eventually feigned conversion to Islam under threat of capital punishment from the Ottoman sultan Mehmed IV. After Zevi's forced conversion to Islam, a number of Sabbatean Jews purportedly converted to Islam while remaining secretly faithful to Judaism after their leader, and became known as the "Dönmeh". Some live on into 21st-century Turkey. As of 2016, there were still 2,000 non-assimilated Dönmeh.
The Turkish word dönmeh ("apostates") derives from the verbal root dön- (Ottoman Turkish: دون) that means "to turn", i.e., "to convert", but in the pejorative sense of "turncoat".
The independent scholar Rıfat Bali defines the term dönmeh as follows:
The term Donme is a Turkish gerund meaning 'to turn, revolve or return' and, by extension, "to betray" (i.e., 'go back on') and 'to convert' to another religion. It has come in popular parlance to refer to religious converts in general, and, more specifically, to the seventeenth century followers of the Jewish false messiah Sabbatai Sevi and their descendants, who outwardly converted to Islam but retained their secretive religious practices over the next several centuries, maintaining close communal and blood ties and practicing strict endogamy. While the great majority of the community's members abandoned their practices during the first quarter century, their past identity has continued to haunt them within Turkish society, and the term Dönme itself remains one of opprobrium.
The Dönmeh were sometimes called Selânikli ("person from Thessalonika") or avdetî (Ottoman Turkish: عودتی, "religious convert"). Members of the group referred to themselves as "the Believers" (Hebrew: המאמינים, romanized: ha-Maʾminim), Ḥaberim "Associates", or Baʿlē Milḥāmā "Warriors", while in the town of Adrianople (now Edirne) they were known as sazanikos, Judaeo-Spanish for "little carps", perhaps about the changing outward nature of the fish or because of the prophecy that Sabbatai Zevi would deliver the Jews under the zodiacal sign of the fish.
When Sabbatai Zevi (1626–1676) converted to Islam in Ottoman Court possibly in exchange for amnesty in 1666, some of his followers followed him into Islam whiles others gave esoteric explanations and dismissals of his conversion. Zevi’s final wife, Ayse, and her father, the esteemed rabbi Joseph Filosof, were originally from Salonica. After Zevi’s death, they returned to the city and played a key role in founding the new religious sect he had initiated. By 1900, Thessaloniki was home to a community of around 10,000 Judeo-Spanish-speaking Muslims. This group was followed by about 3,000 other Sabbateans in 1683, shortly after the death of Nathan of Gaza, which occurred in 1680. Despite their outward conversion to Islam, the Sabbateans secretly remained faithful to Judaism and continued to hold their Kabbalistic theology, along with Jewish beliefs and rituals. These included: recognizing Sabbatai Zevi as the Jewish Messiah, observing certain Jewish commandments with similarities to those in Rabbinic Judaism, and Jewish prayers in Hebrew and Ladino. They also observed rituals celebrating important events in Tzevi's life and interpreted his conversion in accordance with their own interpretation of Lurianic Kabbalah.
The Dönmeh divided into several branches. The first, the İzmirli, was formed in İzmir (Smyrna) and was the original sect, from which two others eventually split. The first schism created the Jacobite (Turkish: Yakubi) sect, founded by Jacob Querido (c. 1650–1690), the brother of Tzevi's last wife. Querido claimed to be Tzevi's reincarnation and proclaimed himself as a Messiah in his own right. The second split from the İzmirli was the result of Beruchiah Russo (1677–1720), which claimed to be Tzevi's successor. These allegations gained attention and gave rise to the Karakashi (Turkish: Karakaşi; Ladino: Konioso), branch, the most numerous and strictest branch of the Dönmeh.
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Dönmeh
The Dönmeh (Hebrew: דוֹנְמֶה, romanized: Dōnme, Ottoman Turkish: دونمه, Turkish: Dönme) are a group of Sabbatean crypto-Jews in the Ottoman Empire who were forced to convert to Islam, but retained their Jewish faith and Kabbalistic beliefs in secret.
The Sabbatean movement was centered mainly in Thessalonika. It originated during and soon after the era of Shabbetai Tzevi, a 17th-century Romaniote Jewish rabbi and Kabbalist who claimed to be the Jewish Messiah and eventually feigned conversion to Islam under threat of capital punishment from the Ottoman sultan Mehmed IV. After Zevi's forced conversion to Islam, a number of Sabbatean Jews purportedly converted to Islam while remaining secretly faithful to Judaism after their leader, and became known as the "Dönmeh". Some live on into 21st-century Turkey. As of 2016, there were still 2,000 non-assimilated Dönmeh.
The Turkish word dönmeh ("apostates") derives from the verbal root dön- (Ottoman Turkish: دون) that means "to turn", i.e., "to convert", but in the pejorative sense of "turncoat".
The independent scholar Rıfat Bali defines the term dönmeh as follows:
The term Donme is a Turkish gerund meaning 'to turn, revolve or return' and, by extension, "to betray" (i.e., 'go back on') and 'to convert' to another religion. It has come in popular parlance to refer to religious converts in general, and, more specifically, to the seventeenth century followers of the Jewish false messiah Sabbatai Sevi and their descendants, who outwardly converted to Islam but retained their secretive religious practices over the next several centuries, maintaining close communal and blood ties and practicing strict endogamy. While the great majority of the community's members abandoned their practices during the first quarter century, their past identity has continued to haunt them within Turkish society, and the term Dönme itself remains one of opprobrium.
The Dönmeh were sometimes called Selânikli ("person from Thessalonika") or avdetî (Ottoman Turkish: عودتی, "religious convert"). Members of the group referred to themselves as "the Believers" (Hebrew: המאמינים, romanized: ha-Maʾminim), Ḥaberim "Associates", or Baʿlē Milḥāmā "Warriors", while in the town of Adrianople (now Edirne) they were known as sazanikos, Judaeo-Spanish for "little carps", perhaps about the changing outward nature of the fish or because of the prophecy that Sabbatai Zevi would deliver the Jews under the zodiacal sign of the fish.
When Sabbatai Zevi (1626–1676) converted to Islam in Ottoman Court possibly in exchange for amnesty in 1666, some of his followers followed him into Islam whiles others gave esoteric explanations and dismissals of his conversion. Zevi’s final wife, Ayse, and her father, the esteemed rabbi Joseph Filosof, were originally from Salonica. After Zevi’s death, they returned to the city and played a key role in founding the new religious sect he had initiated. By 1900, Thessaloniki was home to a community of around 10,000 Judeo-Spanish-speaking Muslims. This group was followed by about 3,000 other Sabbateans in 1683, shortly after the death of Nathan of Gaza, which occurred in 1680. Despite their outward conversion to Islam, the Sabbateans secretly remained faithful to Judaism and continued to hold their Kabbalistic theology, along with Jewish beliefs and rituals. These included: recognizing Sabbatai Zevi as the Jewish Messiah, observing certain Jewish commandments with similarities to those in Rabbinic Judaism, and Jewish prayers in Hebrew and Ladino. They also observed rituals celebrating important events in Tzevi's life and interpreted his conversion in accordance with their own interpretation of Lurianic Kabbalah.
The Dönmeh divided into several branches. The first, the İzmirli, was formed in İzmir (Smyrna) and was the original sect, from which two others eventually split. The first schism created the Jacobite (Turkish: Yakubi) sect, founded by Jacob Querido (c. 1650–1690), the brother of Tzevi's last wife. Querido claimed to be Tzevi's reincarnation and proclaimed himself as a Messiah in his own right. The second split from the İzmirli was the result of Beruchiah Russo (1677–1720), which claimed to be Tzevi's successor. These allegations gained attention and gave rise to the Karakashi (Turkish: Karakaşi; Ladino: Konioso), branch, the most numerous and strictest branch of the Dönmeh.
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